Hughes, Langston: Afro-American Fragment

Afro-American Fragment (English)

So long,
So far away
Is Africa.
Not even memories alive
Save those that history books create,
Save those that songs
Beat back into the blood-
Beat out of blood with words sad-sung
In strange un-Negro tongue -
So long,
So far away
Is Africa.

Subdued and time-lost
Are the drums – and yet
Through some vast mist of race
There comes this song
I do not understand
This song of atavistic land,
Of bitter yearning lost
Without a place -
So long,
So far away
Is Africa’s
Dark face.